The message from Donald Trump

Trump’s second term will change the world for the worse, and holds vital lessons on democracy for us in India, too

The message from Donald Trump

Sundry supporters of the political right around the world cheer Donald Trump’s victory. But not all leaders who feel a quiet sense of satisfaction at the Republican resurrection in the US have the same political orientation or motivation. Let us consider, in turn, Israel’s Netanyahu, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, France’s Macron, and India’s Narendra Modi.

Trump had been, in his first term, the most anti-Palestinian, anti-Muslim US president ever. He had shifted the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, negating Palestinian claims to that ancient town, and persuaded several Muslim states of the Middle East to sign the Abraham Accords, seeking to establish normal relations with Israel. In the ongoing war on Gaza, in contrast to the Biden administration’s stand that Israel must cease fire and negotiate a permanent peace based on a two-state solution, Trump is on record saying that he would let Israel finish the job.

Iran faces big threat

Iran faces a grave threat right now. Biden heads a lame-duck administration. Trump had repudiated the Iran nuclear deal, and is most likely to stand back and applaud, if Israel were to carry out attacks on Iran’s oil installations and nuclear facilities. The best that Biden could do is to withhold US forces in such an offensive.

Trump has said that he would end the Ukraine war in a single day. The only way the war can end that fast is by forcing Ukraine to give up territory and accept peace on Russia’s terms. This must certainly warm the cockles of Putin’s heart, whatever it does to Ukraine’s Zelensky’s blood pressure.

Emmanuel Macron has been a vocal advocate of European strategic autonomy for some time. Before the Ukraine war, he had declared that NATO was brain dead. Other European leaders tended to dismiss this as so much grandstanding, driven by both the tradition of French exceptionalism and Macron’s own Jupiterian delusions of grandeur. Now, with Donald Trump back in the White House, doubling down on his assertion that the US would stand by and watch as Russia did what it wanted with countries that fail to spend 2% of GDP on defence, more European leaders see sense in Europe developing the capacity to defend itself outside the US-dependent and US-led NATO. Grim though it might be, a sense of satisfaction at being proven right must, surely, grip Macron.

Trump not altogether a bad outcome for India

Modi might not get Trump’s first name right every time, but he gets the man, as one strongman gets another. Sure, India’s exports will face higher tariffs in the US, as would exports from all other countries, and China would be virtually shut out from the American market, with 60% tariffs on most imports from China and 100% on electric vehicles. But Trump would normalize othering minorities of different kinds, bullying smaller countries and dispensing with principles in the conduct of international affairs.

India’s own relations with the US are built on the basis of their mutual antipathy towards China, and the US need for an Indo-Pacific power large, diverse and powerful enough to countervail America’s only rival in the Superpower league. Trump ally Elon Musk can be counted on to ensure that Indians are not denied the H1B visas that would enable US tech industry to access the engineering talent it needs, to keep growing.

Fissile effects of Trump’s unreliability

Trump’s brand of burgeoning isolation from the world, in the name of America First, would force American allies in Europe and in the East to prepare to fend for themselves. Japan and South Korea are technologically capable of producing nuclear weapons and missiles. It was only the guarantee of protection under the US nuclear umbrella that had persuaded them to forswear developing their own nuclear deterrent. With unreliable Trump leading the US, it would be remarkable if Japan and South Korea do not go nuclear by the end of his term.

If Iran survives Israel’s pre-emptive strikes, it, too, would go nuclear. Turkeye would wonder why it should not bolster its position as the leader of the Organisation of Turkic States – it comprises, besides Turkeye, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan, with Turkmenistan waiting and watching as an observer – by developing nukes of its own.

The development of such multiple power centres, changing the world from being unipolar or bipolar, is very much to India’s liking. The next time Trump and Modi embrace, the warmth might actually turn out to be genuine.

Economic fallout of Trump’s second coming

For ordinary people, whose cardiovascular systems are left unperturbed by Trump’s second coming, what does it portend? Trump tariffs and retaliation by America’s trade partners would unleash a trade war that would depress global growth. Steep tariffs would push up American prices. A crackdown on illegal immigrants, including mass deportation, would create a labour shortage in the US, pushing up wages, and, thereafter, prices. Trump tax cuts would push up the fiscal deficit, and excess demand would add to inflationary pressures. The Fed would be forced to raise rates eventually, to curb inflation, decelerating the economy. But all such factors would take time to work through the economy, and Trump’s second term might well be over by the time the Fed increases rates again. Trump would leave behind an economic mess, as he had at the end of 2020, while obtuse voters continue to think Republicans are better at managing the economy.

Gender rights receive a setback, as does the principle of democratic equality of all people, with Trump-supporting white supremacists and misogynists feeling vindicated by Trump’s victory. Expect more random attacks on Indians in the US, and greater police brutality that would trigger fresh Black Lives Matter protests. Through American mass media, these negative impulses would spread across the world.

A shortage of butter

Biden had legislated liberal funding for green technologies, including carbon dioxide removal from the air. Trump believes climate change is a hoax. The rest of the world would need to pick up the slack created by US backsliding on climate change.

Butter would go up in price – not because the bosses of Amul decide to do some price-gouging. The world would be forced to spend more on guns, skewing the classic tradeoff between guns and butter.

No democracy without active citizen engagement

The US elections drive home the message that democracy is only as real as constant citizen engagement makes it. Neither being the oldest or the biggest is any guarantee that any democracy would live up to its description.

A politically disengaged public, which is willing to be guided by mediaeval instincts, rather than rational reckoning of the complexity that moulds modern life, will give authoritarian figures a free run, never mind the nature of the formal political system. Social media will amplify the deceptive charm of divisive rabblerousers, unless conscious, consistent efforts are made to create a counter-narrative.

Trump speaks not just to Americans, but to us in India as well.